


Heroes and Villains

by AliWC



Category: White Collar
Genre: Community: collarkink, Other, Pre-OT3, Prompt Fic, roleplaying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-06
Updated: 2011-12-06
Packaged: 2017-10-27 00:17:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/289475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliWC/pseuds/AliWC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for the following prompt on Collarkink:</p><p>(Anonymous)<br/>2011-05-21 02:37 am (local) (link) Track This<br/>Before Peter caught Neal, El initiated some sexy Catwoman/Batman roleplaying to capitalize on Peter's obsession with catching a thief.</p><p>Either the actual role-playing, or Neal finding out about it and wanting in on the fun.</p><p> </p><p>Thank you Mam711 for the beta job.  All mistakes are mine.</p><p>Rated for Adult themes<br/>______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________</p>
    </blockquote>





	Heroes and Villains

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the following prompt on Collarkink:
> 
> (Anonymous)  
> 2011-05-21 02:37 am (local) (link) Track This  
> Before Peter caught Neal, El initiated some sexy Catwoman/Batman roleplaying to capitalize on Peter's obsession with catching a thief.
> 
> Either the actual role-playing, or Neal finding out about it and wanting in on the fun.
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you Mam711 for the beta job. All mistakes are mine.
> 
> Rated for Adult themes  
> ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sometimes, after Peter had come in to work in an especially horrific piece of clothing, Neal would somehow invite himself to dinner at the Burkes, or he’d plant the idea and Peter would tell him he had no choice but to come or risk a return to prison. Either way, Neal would use the opportunity to steal a moment away from the Burkes to raid Peter’s wardrobe.

If he found the offending object, depending on what it was, Neal might proceed to hide the piece and take it home to shred before going shopping for a replacement to give Peter the next Monday. Peter seemed to be unaware of Neal’s attempts to gradually replace his wardrobe, so the con was working.

Of course, sometimes, if the offending object was a tie, Neal couldn’t help but guiltily stash it in a box hidden at the back of his closet. Which was why, when he saw a box stashed at the back of the Burkes‘ closet Neal stared at it, knowing he’d just discovered the ultimate treasure of treasures.

What was it that the Burkes were hiding in that box stashed at the back of their closet?  
Neal hoped very much that it was a dirty little secret. But he kept his hopes in check; after all, this was Peter and Elizabeth, the ultimate straight-laced, and normal, happily-married suburban couple. It could be a stash of coupons for all he knew. He self-consciously checked that he was alone before bending down to remove the box from its cloaked hiding place.

There, with one knee on the floor, the box propped on his remaining knee, Neal took a deep breath and removed the lid, slowly, counting the seconds. Then he was staring at the contents. For a second, he couldn’t work it out; it seemed to be a heap of black-dyed fabric and dark latex, then he nudged a fold and there it gleamed—the bat symbol—and Neal felt his eyes shine from the excitement of what he’d found.

“No way,” he breathed, already gleefully looking forward to using all the bad puns he could think of to tease Peter at work.

Neal knew somehow that this was no Halloween costume. It wasn’t risqué or anything, but he just knew. He drew it out, standing as he raised the costume and watched it unfold, the box lying on the ground. He had to admire it: it wasn’t bad for home entertainment use, but then the box caught his eye and Neal just about fainted from the rise in delight; his nerves were already fraying from the thrill of finding a Batsuit, but this? Neal laid the costume on the bed and like a porn-hungry schoolboy dashed back over to the box to caress the second costume which had been hidden from view.

“Meoooow,” Neal whispered, a bemused smirk blossoming on his features. Catwoman. “Oh, Elizabeth!”

As Neal relieved the box of its second precious parcel, he spotted a piece of paper. His suspicions flaring, Neal snaked out nimble fingers and brought it up to read. It was a receipt, the kind that came with mail orders: an invoice. Dated …

“Two-thousand and two,” Neal murmured. “But that’s….”

Two thousand and two had been the year Peter had started chasing him.

Neal, smiling shakily, dropped the small sheet of paper back into the box and rose to his feet, the Catwoman outfit hooked in the crook of his left elbow. It had to be a coincidence. But the potential metaphors were not lost on him. Batman, the keeper of peace, the fighter of crime, chasing Catwoman … someone Batman found himself enchanted by, maybe even ensnared? How had that ended again? Neal was hardly well versed in the DC universe. He’d studied a few aspects once for a con involving a certain red cape, and Moz sometimes mentioned lunch boxes, but he wasn’t all that familiar with the DCU characters.

Neal knew he had little time left, if any at all; he would be missed soon, and though the Burkes were used to him taking long trips to the bathroom, courtesy of Neal’s past visits to Peter’s closet, he had already been gone longer than usual.

He thought about returning the costumes to the box and pretending nothing had changed, but rather suddenly, with the tantalizing idea that the Burkes might possibly be as into him as he was with them … it suddenly ached too much to be ignored. He had to know.

He gathered the Batman costume up and made his way out of the room. He paused at the top of the stairs but forced himself to go, to continue before he could back out. His heart beat wildly, as if trying to escape the awkward situation it knew was coming.

What came next, Neal knew, could either make or break him. If the Burkes gave Neal a blank, annoyed look or even laughed off his discovery but gave no indication of any hope in their eyes or … he’d even settle for embarrassment because that would support his theory that Peter chasing him had inspired these particular role-playing games.

Neal tightened his hold as the thought of what the Burkes had done with each other in these outfits occurred to him properly. He wanted to smell the outfits now and he wished he’d stayed upstairs for a few minutes longer but he’d already gone around the bend in the staircase. It was too late. Any moment now, one or both the Burkes would look up from their idle conversation to the sight of him standing before them holding their deepest secrets.

Elizabeth spotted him first as she turned in the middle of a ‘discussion’ with the full intent of recruiting Neal to support her side, but all thoughts of her argument were lost as she took in the sight of Neal standing there, chewing his lip, looking like he wanted to be his usual easy-going self, complete with a smirk but couldn’t quite muster up the exterior. It was as though their reactions were somehow important to him.

Obviously El was quick on the uptake. Maybe Peter knew Neal better but when it came to people in the general sense, El was the expert so she saw all of the above within seconds, whereas all Peter could think when he, in turn, set his sights on Neal was ‘defend, defend!’ even as a blush took over his face.

“Oh,” Peter managed to mutter bitterly. Peter tried not to let the desperation into his tone, but he just knew that Neal had thought of a thousand and one ways to use this against them. “So, you’re thinking you’ve got an unlimited pass to any museum you want to see outside your radius, huh?”

What was the thief doing in their room in the first place? He knew he could easily cart Neal back for snooping, but that would involve potentially admitting to the FBI that Caffrey had found role-playing outfits in their closet. And the last thing he needed was for people to start asking questions.

He was mortified that Neal had found those things in the first place, but he felt even more horror at the idea that Neal would discover that he was … well, his chase of Neal—his lust for the chase—and specifically the idea of catching Neal was what had inspired the game in the first place.

“My knowledge is a bit dodgy when it comes to Batman, his friends and foes,” Neal said suddenly. “But wasn’t there some guy called Catman?”

Peter and Elizabeth both looked at Neal, shocked by the odd spiel. Neal could see the question in Peter’s eyes, and the creeping hysterical laughter bubbling up in Elizabeth.

Neal shrugged and then he suggested shyly, “I can hardly blackmail you if I’m part of it?”

Peter lost all rationality then; his only thought was an image that flashed through his mind of having these two—who were clearly going to be a lot of trouble for him—pinned beneath him, looking up at him with identical eyes, wide and full of expectant delight, with expanding grins as they each tickled his ribs with those fake nails. And the best thing was, it was all actually possible. Neal had just….

Peter needed to sit down.

No. He needed to stop worrying. He met El’s eyes. She had a knowing smug look of excitement, like she was eons ahead of Peter and was patiently waiting for him to catch up. With her silent encouragement, Peter let his stress die away.

He pictured her in the Catwoman outfit that she hadn’t worn in years … since—since the chase had ended. Then he looked at Neal. Neal in latex and black fabric—oh…. Peter almost gave a strangled whine. And it was actually possible! But geez, they’d have trouble undressing with all the latex and fabric zipped up tight and in the way….

Then Peter came back to the moment in which they all stood silently waiting … and he couldn’t help but think, as he looked from Neal to El and back, that the energy used in getting them to where he wanted them would be well spent.


End file.
